Remembering Anne Suddick.1948-2021

This page has been set up with support from the following organisations, Education 4 Action, The Durham Miners Association and the Women's Banner Group and in response to the news of the death of our comrade and friend Anne Suddick . Our goal is to raise sufficient funds to cover the cost of Anne's funeral and associated expenses as well as create a lasting memorial in her memory. This will be a bench to be placed in the grounds Of Redhills Miners Hall. Any monies raised in excess of the goal will be donated to the Redhills Appeal.

For anyone involved or affected by the Miners’ strike of 1984/85 Anne will need no introduction. As the co-ordinator of the county wide Miners support group Anne played a pivotal role in providing support and financial assistance to striking miners and their families. Her dedication, skills and boundless energy ensured that the commitment to providing a food parcel or voucher weekly throughout the strike or a daily hot meal via a kitchen was fully achieved. The range of fundraising activities campaigns and demo's she organised are too numerous to mention but her idea that every County Durham family in that conflict should receive a toy for each child and a turkey for each family to provide some semblance of a normal Christmas deserves special mention as the scale of the task was immense yet was achieved but only through Anne's amazing organisational skills ,powers of persuasion and doggedness.

Following the strike Anne continued her activism playing a key role the justice for mineworker’s campaign raising funds to support sacked and victimized miners determined they would never be forgotten. Anne was also a leading figure in the Women against pit closures movement. Anne was active in many political and community campaigns during her life, but she was also a talented poet, musician committed feminist and inspiring public speaker.

Sadly, in her later life Ann encountered physical and emotional health problems as well as financial difficulties which may in part be linked to the enormous stress she experienced during the strike and several years afterward. Anne was single and what little family she has, while desperately wanting to organise a funeral for her are sadly not in a position to do so. This page has therefore been set up by a number of former strike activists and friends in gratitude for the support Anne gave to us during the strike. We are appealing to the people of former mining communities, to trade unionists, political activists, feminists and socialists across the North East and beyond to contribute as little or as much as you can afford to help us ensure Anne's legacy is not lost. Please support us.